


ink and camphor

by rosynosed



Category: Doctor Who
Genre: F/M, Mickey only mentioned
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-21
Updated: 2020-01-21
Packaged: 2021-02-27 10:07:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 835
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22341526
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rosynosed/pseuds/rosynosed
Summary: Rose can’t bring herself to sleep when her mind is stuck on the Doctor, and the smell of his stupid coat.
Relationships: Tenth Doctor/Rose Tyler
Kudos: 26





	ink and camphor

The easiest way for Rose Tyler to tie the knot between the Doctor and his prior face was by the way he smelled. Despite his superficially younger skin, and wider soil tinged eyes, he managed to retain that aroma of ink and camphor that seemed to always stain his clothing.

Between the dozens of planets and galaxies and time periods she’d breathed in, his scent managed to be the one she was most drawn to. 

She’d never let him know, of course, but in the few times she stays back at her mum’s place she’s bought herself a candle that she found most closely resembled his fragrance, though it was a cheap job of it. 

She lies awake in the TARDIS, staring at the ceiling and wondering what was beyond it at this point. If she were to go beyond it would the sky mirror the hue of oblivion or those flowers from that planet she’d been to last week? Would it be a canopy of stars, or a stream of clouds with contrasting colors that fogged her head if she stared for too long. 

Do the stars smell of that ink and camphor too?

She rolls over onto her stomach and breathes in her bedsheets, hoping that they’d somehow between folds of laundry and his casual drifts into her bedroom to alert her wake, picked up a hint of his scent.  
But it was to no avail, they smelled absently of another human, the only bouquet it bled was that of worn cashmere and her strawberry shampoo.

She heaved a sigh, pulling back her white covers and reaching to turn on the lamp on her bedside table, hair spilling across her face and prolonging her from gaining sight again. She slicked her blonde locks into a ponytail and gazed at her door, itching to pry it open and tiptoe past halls of linoleum only to inch into the library, where he’d be sitting with propped up legs and eyes fixated on a novel he’d more than likely already read half of a dozen times. She’d sit on the arm of him chair, which would frustrate him and he’d scold her to move, to which she’d force him to scoot over within the small cushion of his chair and squeeze herself in next to him- interrupting his story but allowing him to pick up a new one, that he’d tell audibly as she took in every word, the same way she would the perfume of ink and camphor.

But she wasn’t in the library.  
She was in her room.  
Alone.  
Well, besides the painfully lonely company of that unsatiang odor of cashmere and her cheap shampoo. 

She yearned to see him again, to weave her way into his arms, and stay just long enough that his fragrance would bleed into her own clothing, the way Mickey’s would when he’d spend hours gripping her shirts while they watched his favorite sports on his couch.

His scent was far less captivating though. There was a time she was drawn to it, but as time progressed what was once endearing became the source of nausea. The combination smell of gasoline and that musty cologne became something she would, in private, try to desperately scrub out of her wardrobe.

She wrinkled her nose, and took in a deep breath, grateful not to take in the odor of Mickey Smith, but was quickly disheartened upon the absence of the Doctors.  
Fat load of bullshit it all was.

Defeated, Rose slumped out of her bed and wandered out of her bedroom to get some water.

She tip-toed down the hallway, careful not to wake the Doctor in the off change that he was sleeping, (though, she figured he wasn’t, superior Time Lord biology and all of that hallabaloo) and slipped into the kitchen of the TARDIS. 

“Why Rose Tyler, what are you doing up at this hour?” The Doctor shouted to Rose’s backside, making her hair quickly back to face him.

Her eyes widened, “Rough time sleepin’ I s’ppose. You?”

“Superior Time Lord biology!”

There it was.

Rose nodded, “Well I think I’m just going to get some water and try and sleep again.”

The Time Lord raised a finger, “Well! Before you sleep I had a grand idea!@

“Mm?”

“Welllll I realized the TARDIS has picked up a bit of a weird smell since our last stop a Krop Tor and decided it needed a bit of a change! So I picked up a couple of candles! Care to light ‘em in various rooms? I stopped and picked em up at some other planet while you were asleep and they should help cover all of that stench!”

Rose smiled, “I’d be happy to! Seems a bit domestic for you though, doesn’t it? Candles...makes the whole spaceship be a bit home-y, eh?”

“Watch your mouth miss tyler, and take this candle!” The doctor warned, handing her a candle.

She looked down and read the label of it.

Strawberry and cashmere.


End file.
